A Wander In Clumberland

Charles Hartley recalls his best sporting day of 2019 — a rough day out with his Clumber spaniel, Bertie, and plenty of species on offer

- Charles Hartley

My day-to-day life is set far from the field. I work as an auctioneer where the start of the pheasant season and end of the grouse is dominated by major sales and deadlines. But as November crashes into December and Jack Frost grabs a firm hold, exceptions must be made.

One of my permissions sits in a wonderful no-man’s-land, nestled between the overgrazed fields below and the keepered moor above. It represents an undulating steep edge filled with damp sedge, ankle grabbing bracken, sparse patches of heather, stunted trees and the chance that anything could happen. Once a season when the weather is particularly bad, my Clumber spaniel Bertie and I hit this ground in a one-man-and-his-dog bid for the ultimate rough shoot.

The species list is as varied as the terrain, with grouse, pheasants, woodcock, snipe, woodpigeons, rabbits and grey squirrels finding their way into the bag over the years. Both outstanding days and empty bags have been had. The aim of the mission is never wholesale slaughter; more a tale of quality over quantity, with a single good bird enough.

Painful frost

Usually the worse the weather, the better the sport, with the best days being thick with snow or painful with frost; the theory being that many of the moorland species drop on to the sheltered edge in tough conditions. As the end of the grouse season was fast approaching, I was forced out into upsettingly comfortable conditions, with only a minor frost to speak of.

Though this left me a touch pensive, I couldn’t help but silently hum with excitement as the internal dynamo within my spaniel picked up energy on our march towards the hill. We paused for a moment on the boundary on to this utopia, silently watching and listening for telltale signs of life. With a single ‘go-back’ of a grouse out of sight, the shotgun action clicked shut and dog was unleashed.